Empire Express by David Haward Bain

Author:David Haward Bain [Bain, David Haward]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781101658048
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2000-08-31T16:00:00+00:00

Collis Huntington found himself in Washington a great deal in late October, November, and December, seeing even for him an extraordinary number of legislators as they trickled into town after the elections. Waving “the bloody shirt,” for the most part, had failed for the radical Republicans: after the fall election campaign was over, after the Democrats had swept New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and California, coming close in Ohio, Kansas, and Minnesota, among others, after suffrage for African Americans had been defeated in various referenda, Washington in November was a settlement on edge—unsure whether it had just endured a war to end all wars or merely another battle in an unfolding, complicated, often baffling campaign. Thaddeus Stevens, rumored to have been dying only weeks before, showed the rumors to be true when he appeared among his congressional troops, pale, emaciated, and easily exhausted when the special session was called on November 21; even his home town had voted Democratic. It was a place of mixed moods; only Andrew Johnson, who interpreted his party’s devastating defeat as a rebuke of the radicals, seemed to be eerily cheerful, waiting for his enemies in Congress to make a move over his suspension of War Secretary Stanton, in August, for treachery; by doing so against the will of Congress Johnson had violated the radicals’ Tenure in Office Act. Trying to mitigate the removal by replacing Stanton with the reluctant and unreadable General Grant had surprisingly backfired, however, as the war hero was being villified for “going over” to the president; as far as Johnson was concerned, every day Grant seemed less distinct than his enveloping cloud of cigar smoke.

Huntington, at least, had formed a clear picture of every one of his enemies, and also his friends. In their campaign for Goat Island, Huntington would be the front man, just as Washington would be their first and most crucial test; the California Associates would quietly bide their time, staying away from the state legislature until Huntington obtained his federal grant for the island. As the weeks unfolded through the special session toward the opening of the Fortieth Congress’s regular second session, on December 2, he had been in constant contact with his lobbyist, former congressman Richard Franchot, who had already sized up the new California delegation as “not worth much” and who was keeping his eye on two pieces of legislation involving rights to Goat Island. One, of course, was the Central Pacific’s. The other was on the behalf of the upstart San Francisco and Vallejo ring calling themselves the Terminal Central Pacific Company—there were some old enemies of Huntington’s behind that, such as J. Mora Moss (formerly of the Sacramento Valley Railroad), Alpheus Bull (previously of the California and Oregon, and determined to seize it back), and two Boston financiers, James P. Flint of Flint, Peabody, and his son Edward P. Flint. The elder Flint had earned Huntington’s emnity several years before by promising to market Central Pacific bonds and then sitting on them;

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